


broken hearts

by escapismandsharpobjects



Category: Grimm (TV)
Genre: Crying, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Nightmares, Past Character Death, Post-Season/Series 04, Pre-Relationship, Whumptober 2020, but it doesn't necessarily have to be you feel me?, post s4 but only the parts of the season i didnt hate, this is kinda
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2020-10-20
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:48:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,412
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27112864
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/escapismandsharpobjects/pseuds/escapismandsharpobjects
Summary: whumptober day 19 - prompt: grief, mourning loved one. after the death of his mom, nick isn't exactly coping well. eventually, he breaks, and someone is there for him.
Relationships: Nick Burkhardt & Hank Griffin
Comments: 4
Kudos: 16
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	broken hearts

**Author's Note:**

> hi like i said briefly in the tags this is post season 4 but only the parts of season 4 i did not hate. so basically nothing with adalind, no child or any of that shit, juliette is not dead, she's not here but she's not dead bc. no thank you. and yeah this doesn't make a lot of sense if you try and think about any other events in canon so just suspend reality for a moment and let's just focus on the most important thing...making nick suffer :)

Nick has been trying his hardest to be okay. He really has. He’s back at work and giving awkward half-smiles of thanks to the people that continually apologize to him; and politely refusing their offers to cover his shifts or bring him lunch or coffee. They’re always asking if he wants to talk. But he’s not talking to anyone about anything, because the second he stops moving he knows that everything is going to collapse. 

He doesn’t really sleep most nights. An hour here, fifteen minutes there. Any more than that and he wakes up screaming, the image of his mother’s head, neatly boxed up, burned into the backs of his eyes. As though he’s not already seeing her everywhere, all the time. 

So he doesn’t sleep. He doesn’t really cry, either. He thinks he should but there’s something stopping him. He avoids being around the people that care about him. He refuses to let them touch him. If they do, if there’s one friendly, kind, concerned hand on his body, he knows he is going to shatter, finally, no matter who or where. 

And maybe that wouldn’t be such a bad thing, he thinks, sometimes, when he’s lying awake at night on top of the covers of his bed with the lights all on. Maybe if there was someone with him, someone telling him that it would all be okay, someone just  _ being there _ and letting him break and holding on to him. Maybe then he’d start to feel better, or at least feel less like he’s slowly sinking into something deep and dark that he knows he’s going to sink into until he reaches a point where he can’t get out. 

He doesn’t want that. He feels that deep, dark thing clawing at him sometimes, and has to stop himself from letting it out on someone that doesn’t deserve it. Or even someone that does, because then he will have to live with the consequences.

So this is his life. Fight the horrible grief and anger that builds continuously up under his skin, sleep for one or two hours a day and be put face-to-face with that grief and anger in the form of a screaming nightmare, wake up and wish that he could find it in himself to cry, go to work, avoid everyone, repeat. It  _ hurts  _ and he can feel it chipping away at him, and he knows, knows, knows that something is going to have to break eventually. But that  _ eventually  _ never really seems to come, so he just keeps on going. 

But, of course, nothing can hold on forever. The strongest chain breaks. The tallest building crumbles. The smallest wound bleeds you dry. Nick is no exception.

It happens on a windy, wet Tuesday night. Nick jolts awake shortly after midnight with a scream, the same way he’s been waking up for the past few weeks. 

His dream had been no worse than normal, but the thing about these kinds of dreams is that they never get any easier to have. His mind may be used to it, but all his body knows is grief. It reacts instinctively. He’s sweaty, and trembling, and his heart is pounding out of his chest, and he’s breathing in rapid, frantic inhales. He looks around the room like he’s afraid there’s something lurking in the corners and feels the beginning of a sob in his throat, which dies with a whimper before he can let it out. 

On the surface, there’s nothing different about this particular night. It’s the same nightmare he’s been having for weeks, the same reaction. Everything is as it’s been. And this is the problem. Everything is as it’s been for too long. The anger and grief that he’s been repressing and trying to ignore had never gone away. It’s just been compacted and shoved down, so that quite a lot of it could fit inside of his body, but it’s finally reached its bursting point. 

There’s no more space within him for any more anger or grief, not when he hasn’t let any of it properly out. Everything in him is screaming for some kind of release, but he can’t - he  _ can’t, _ he doesn’t want to do it alone, he’s been alone too long and if he breaks now, by himself in the dark, he’s not sure he will ever be able to patch himself up. 

So he calls Hank, shaking hands fumbling in the dark, the ringing noise almost inaudible over his horribly shaky breathing. Hank picks up on the second ring.

“Nick? What’s wrong?” He sounds half-asleep, and ordinarily Nick would be kicking himself for not thinking to check the time, for waking up Hank with his own problems. But he can’t think about that now. All that matters is it’s  _ Hank  _ and he’s _ there. _

He takes a shuddering breath and tries to hold back his tears for a little longer, though even just  _ hearing  _ Hank’s voice on the other end of the phone has nearly sent him over the edge. “I’m-” he says, and he can’t figure out what to say next. “I wanted, I needed, I…” He can’t think. Everything is too much and he just wants Hank to be there. 

“I’m coming, Nick, just hold on, okay?” 

And that does it. The fact that Hank is  _ coming, _ without any kind of explanation from him, in the middle of the night, just  _ breaks  _ him. Suddenly, he’s crying, for, really, the first time since that awful night. Everything just comes pouring out of him, tearing its way out of his throat with such a force that he can’t quite breathe. Distantly, Hank says something, and Nick focuses on his voice as the world crumbles around him. 

He’s still sobbing, curled into a ball on the bed with his arms wrapped around his body, when Hank comes through the door. Nick doesn’t hear him at first, too completely caught up in his grief, but then there’s an arm around his shoulders and a weight settling next to him on the bed and a voice speaking softly and calmly and gently. 

“Hank,” he says, the name scratchy and raw as it leaves his aching throat. “Hank,” he repeats, and turns to the side so that Hank is no longer sitting next to him but instead is directly in front of him. He forces his eyes open, tears still pouring down his cheeks, and looks at Hank. 

Hank looks right back at him, and his face is clear and open even in the dark. “I’ve got you,” he says, like he’s making a promise. He reaches out his arms, and Nick sinks into them, pressing his face into Hank’s chest. 

He tries for a second to stop crying and say something, anything, but he may as well have tried to stop breathing. He coughs into the front of Hank’s shirt and inhales, sniffing. Another sob builds up in his throat and he tries to force it back down, half choking on it instead.

Hank’s arms wrap around him, then, and a hand rubs up and down his back. “Just let it out, man, it’s okay,” Hank says. So Nick does. He cries and  _ cries  _ and Hank doesn’t once try to stop him, just keeps holding on and saying those soft, gentle things. 

Eventually, what feels like hours later, Nick finally cries himself to sleep. Even then, Hank stays, gently shifting Nick off of himself and into a position more suitable for sleeping. He lies down next to Nick without considering any kind of alternative, and Nick, breathing evenly for the first time all night, with shiny tear tracks decorating his face, reaches out an unconscious, instinctual hand and grabs onto Hank, like it’s the most natural thing in the world. Hank returns the gesture, and soon the both of them are fast asleep.

\--

Nick wakes up in the morning confused, with scratchy eyes and an aching throat and Hank still sleeping soundly next to him. The usual grief washes over him, and he settles into it a little easier than he had yesterday. Hank makes a soft noise in his sleep and Nick looks over at him, all peaceful and relaxed in the early morning light, and almost smiles. For the first time since his mother’s death, a thought occurs to him, and he wants so badly for it to be true. 

Maybe, just maybe, there will come a day where he is okay again.

**Author's Note:**

> hi thanks so much for reading this!! i have a feeling it's not super coherent but idc this was just. so nice to write i needed to do it yknow? anyway i hope that you liked this and please let me know if you did!!


End file.
